Hassan Al Hallaq's pregnant wife, two sons, mother and sister were killed in an Israeli airstrike on Sunday.

Dad Relives Israeli Strike in Gaza That Wiped Out His Family

By Ayman Mohyeldin

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Hassan Al Hallaq did what any sensible parent would do: When the latest bout of violence erupted here, he moved his family — heavily pregnant wife, Samar, and two young sons — away from their apartment on the outskirts of town and into the middle of Gaza City.

Away from the border, away from the tunnels, the rockets and the front line, All Hallaq thought his wife and sons Kenan, 6, and four-year-old Saji would be safe.

The IT manager at a Palestinian bank had lived with his family through two previous wars and knew his neighborhood in East Gaza would be targeted by the Israelis because it is close to the border.

So he did what the Israelis always told Gaza residents to do: He packed his belongings and moved his entire family along with his parents to his sister’s apartment deep into the city.

That apartment complex was made up of several buildings, dozens of apartments, hundreds of residents and visitors — it’s in a middle-class neighborhood.

"We thought that it was the safest place in Gaza City because it is the center of the city also the Israelis through to their warnings to all dangerous areas, they say, we advise that you move to the center of the city," Al Hallaq told NBC News from his bedside, still recuperating from the devastating blast.

Courtesy Hassan Al Hallaq

Hassan Al Hallaq's sons Kenan, 6, and Saji, 4, were both killed by an Israeli strike in Gaza City.

On Sunday, as his family was preparing to break the daily Ramadan fast at about 7 p.m., two Israeli missiles slammed into the building where they were staying along with his parents.

"All of a sudden we hear a huge explosion happened in the house. I found myself thrown on the floor, everybody screaming around... I was sitting in the outer room with my father and my two brothers ... the rest of the family are in the back of the house — all of them have passed away. Only we who were sitting in the outside room survived."

Al Hallaq and his two brothers and father survived. His 29-year-old wife, his mother, his sister and the three children who were in the back part of the home were killed. His wife was due to give birth within days to their third boy. They were married for seven years, but it was all gone in a matter of seconds.

Despite all of the challenges, he wanted to raise his children in Gaza close to his family.

"I did my best to raise my children, to prepare them ... to let them live a peaceful life, and all of a sudden I lost everything, I lost the memories, I lost the plans, I don't know ... I lost everything, I don't have any thoughts of what's coming."

It's civilians like Al Hallaq who are paying the price of the fight. Israel carries out punitive airstrikes against Hamas militants with deadly consequences for the very same residents it evacuated from other neighborhoods. More than 70 percent of those killed have been civilians, according to the United Nations.

Nowhere is safe.

Courtesy Hassan Al Hallaq

Hassan Al Hallaq's wife Samar, 29, was due to give birth within days.

This type of civilian devastation has led the UN Human Rights chief to say that Israel may be committing war crimes. But High Commissioner Navi Pillay, opening an emergency debate at the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva, also condemned the indiscriminate firing of rockets and mortars by Palestinian militants into Israel.

The international condemnations mean little to families in Gaza who feel the international community has abandoned them.

They are even more meaningless to survivors like Al Hallaq, who know they will never have their families back in their arms despite everything they did to protect them.

First published July 23 2014, 12:08 PM

Ayman Mohyeldin

Since joining NBC News in September 2011, Mohyeldin has reported on the Arab world, including Egypt, Libya, Syria, Jordan, Turkey, Gaza and Lebanon. Inside Syria, Ayman traveled across the country reporting exclusively on the Syrian war, both with opposition rebels and government officials. He also has reported from Europe and across the U.S.

Prior to joining NBC, Mohyeldin was a correspondent for Al Jazeera English based in Cairo, where he was at the epicenter of Arab uprisings covering the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt. From May 2008 until May 2010, Ayman was the only foreign broadcast journalist based in the Gaza Strip, a period in which he was the only American reporter covering the 2008-09 War on Gaza.

From 2003 to2006, he was based in Baghdad, covering the immediate aftermath of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the daily struggle of ordinary Iraqis and the Iraqi insurgency. Mohyeldin was among the few international journalists allowed to observe and report on the U.S. handover of Saddam Hussein to an Iraqi judge.

In 2011, Time Magazine named Mohyeldin as one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World.

Mohyeldin's reporting has won a Peabody Award, the UK's Cutting Edge Media Award and Argentina's Perfil International Press Freedom Award. He also has received multiple Emmy nominations.

Mohyeldin was born in Cairo, Egypt and grew up in the U.S. and the Middle East.